The present invention relates to utility carts and in particular relates to a two-wheeled cart that is easily portable.
It is often desirable to move bulky items such as yard debris around a home, or to move hunting or camping equipment across rough terrain, which may include soft soil, be swampy, or be covered with snow, to a camp site. Various carts available in the past, however, have not been completely satisfactory for such uses, for various reasons.
Where heavy loads are expected to be carried it is desirable for a cart to be of sturdy construction and to include strong handles, located at a convenient height above the surface supporting the cart, in such locations that they can be used simultaneously by two people. While some such carts have been available in the past they have usually been quite heavy.
For a cart intended to be used in hunting, and particularly for moving large animals such as deer or elk after they have been shot, it is desirable for a cart to be reasonably large, yet such a cart should not be too heavy, and should be able to be configured easily as a package small enough to be placed into a vehicle such as a pick-up truck, without occupying too much of the available space.
It is desirable for a cart intended to be operated on uneven ground to have large diameter wheels, but where there is a likelihood that snow or soft ground will be encountered, a cart with large wheels may be of little use to carry objects, and a sled could be the only practical way to carry cargo easily. Simply removing the wheels from previously known carts, however, does not make them useful as sleds, since the axles or other structures used to attach wheels to some previously available carts projects beneath the cargo-box or body of such carts. In other carts, such as that disclosed in Myers U.S. Pat. No. 4,266,791, the bottom is flat, but upright ends make the body impractical as a sled when the wheels have been removed, and handles would be at an inconvenient height.
What is desired, then, is a utility cart useful for carrying loads over rough or smooth terrain, and which may be converted when desired for use as a sled to carry such loads over snow or in other locations where wheels will not provide adequate support. Such a cart should also be able to be carried or stored in a reasonably small amount of space.